Childhood maltreatment associated with adolescent peer networks: Withdrawal, avoidance, and fragmentation

Background: Childhood maltreatment can affect subsequent social relationships, including different facets of peer relationships. Yet, how prior maltreatment shapes adolescents' connections within school peer networks is unclear, despite the rich literature showing the importance of this structural aspect of social integration in adolescence.

Objectives: This study examines how childhood physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, and physical neglect predict adolescent social network structure as withdrawal, avoidance, and fragmentation among peers.

Participants and setting: Data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) Waves I, III, and IV yield a sample of 9154 respondents with valid network data and survey of childhood maltreatment.

Methods: Models using linear regression examine childhood maltreatment predicting withdrawal, avoidance, and fragmentation in adolescent peer networks. Maltreatment is first measured as ever occurring, then separately by maltreatment type.

Results: Results indicate that experiencing any maltreatment leads to withdrawal (lower sociality, B = -0.214, p = 0.008), avoidance (lower popularity, B = -0.222, p = 0.007), and fragmentation (lower cohesion, B = -0.009, p < 0.001). However, different types of maltreatment are associated with different dimensions of peer networks, with only physical neglect impacting all three dimensions.

Conclusions: Experiencing any maltreatment in childhood predicts lower integration in the adolescent peer network structure across three dimensions. However, distinct types of maltreatment relate differently to separate network dimensions, with sexual abuse predicting withdrawal, emotional and physical abuse predicting avoidance and fragmentation, and physical neglect predicting lower integration on all three dimensions.